People who bought this also bought...

Scarlet Feather

New York Times best-selling author Maeve Binchy has a way of making everyday experiences extraordinary. Scarlet Feather introduces budding entrepreneurs Cathy and Tom who, along with their extended families, meet the trials and rewards of life head on. Scarlet Feather is a new catering company formed by two friends from cooking school, Cathy Scarlet and Tom Feather. Their dream is to have the best business in Dublin.

A Week in Winter

Stoneybridge is a small town on the west coast of Ireland where all the families know one another. When Chicky Starr decides to take an old, decaying mansion set high on the cliffs overlooking the windswept Atlantic Ocean and turn it into a restful place for a holiday by the sea, everyone thinks she is crazy. Helped by Rigger (a bad boy turned good who is handy around the house) and Orla, her niece (a whiz at business), Chicky is finally ready to welcome the first guests to Stone House’s big warm kitchen, log fires, and understated elegant bedrooms.

Heart and Soul

With the insight, humor, and compassion we have come to expect from her, Maeve Binchy tells a story of family, friends, patients, and staff who are part of a heart clinic in a community caught between the old and the new Ireland.

Chestnut Street

Maeve Binchy imagined a street in Dublin with many characters coming and going, and every once in a while she would write about one of these people. She would then put it in a drawer; “for the future,” she would say. The future is now. Across town from St. Jarlath’s Crescent, featured in Minding Frankie, is Chestnut Street, where neighbors come and go. Behind their closed doors we encounter very different people with different life circumstances, occupations, and sensibilities.

Tara Road

When two unhappy women switch homes for the summer, there are extraordinary consequences, and each learns that the other has a deep secret that can never be revealed. At the end of the summer, when the women at last meet face-to-face, they find that they have become, firmly and forever, good friends.

Whitethorn Woods

When a new highway threatens to bypass the town of Rossmore and cut through Whitethorn Woods, everyone has a passionate opinion about whether the town will benefit or suffer. But young Father Flynn is most concerned with the fate of St. Ann's Well, which is set at the edge of the woods and slated for destruction. People have been coming to St. Ann's for generations to share their dreams and fears, and speak their prayers.

Maeve's Times: In Her Own Words

From the royal wedding to boring airplane companions, Samuel Beckett to Margaret Thatcher, "senior moments" to life as a waitress, Maeve's Times gives us wonderful insight into a changing Ireland as it celebrates the work of one of our best-loved writers in all its diversity - revealing her characteristic directness, laugh-out-loud humor, and unswerving gaze into the true heart of a matter.

A Few of the Girls: Stories

A Few of the Girls is a glorious collection of the very best of her short story writing, stories that were written over the decades - some published in magazines, others for friends as gifts, many for charity benefits. The stories are all filled with the signature warmth and humor that have always been an essential part of Maeve's appeal.

Nights of the Rain and Stars

In a small Greek island village, a group of travelers from around the world and the local residents they encounter are brought together in unexpected ways when sudden tragedy strikes. In her inimitable style, Maeve Binchy shares with readers the lives of these strangers, learning their hopes, dreams, and fears as they move forward, forever changed by their experience.

The Return Journey

A secretary's silent passion for her boss meets the acid test on a business trip...A man and a woman's mutual disdain at first sight shows how deceptive appearances can be...An insecure wife clings to the illusion of order, only to discover chaos at the hands of a house sitter who opens the wrong doors...A pair of star-crossed travelers take each other's bags, and then learn that when you unlock a stranger's suitcase, you enter a stranger's life.

The Homecoming and Other Stories

In 'Homecoming', read by Sean Campion, the Brennans run Quentin's restaurant in Dublin for the owner, who lives abroad. But what will happen when he suddenly pays a visit? 'Telling Stories', read by Joanna Myers, sees Irene's fiancé turning up the night before the wedding with a face as white as the dress that is to be worn the next day. Then trouble starts....

Truly Madly Guilty

In Truly Madly Guilty, Liane Moriarty takes on the foundations of our lives: marriage, sex, parenthood, and friendship. She shows how guilt can expose the fault lines in the most seemingly strong relationships, how what we don't say can be more powerful than what we do, and how sometimes it is the most innocent of moments that can do the greatest harm.

An Irish Country Love Story: A Novel

It's the winter of 1967, and snow is on the ground in the colorful Irish village of Ballybucklebo, but the chilly weather can't stop love from warming hearts all over the county. Not just the love between a man and woman, as with young doctor Barry Laverty and his fiancée, Sue Nolan, who are making plans to start a new life together, but also the love of an ailing pensioner for a faithful dog that's gone missing, the love of the local gentry for the great estate they are on the verge of losing, or Dr. Fingal Flahertie O'Reilly's love for his longtime home and practice.

New York socialite Caroline Ferriday has her hands full with her post at the French consulate and a new love on the horizon. But Caroline's world is forever changed when Hitler's army invades Poland in September 1939 - and then sets its sights on France. An ocean away from Caroline, Kasia Kuzmerick, a Polish teenager, senses her carefree youth disappearing as she is drawn deeper into her role as courier for the underground resistance movement.

Here's to Us

Celebrity chef Deacon Thorpe has always been a force of nature with an insatiable appetite for life. But after that appetite contributes to Deacon's shocking death in his favorite place on earth, a ramshackle Nantucket summer cottage, his (messy, complicated) family is reeling. Now Deacon's three wives, his children, and his best friend gather on the island he loved to say farewell.

Small Great Things: A Novel

Ruth Jefferson is a labor and delivery nurse at a Connecticut hospital with more than 20 years' experience. During her shift, Ruth begins a routine checkup on a newborn, only to be told a few minutes later that she's been reassigned to another patient. The parents are white supremacists and don't want Ruth, who is African American, to touch their child. The hospital complies with their request, but the next day the baby goes into cardiac distress while Ruth is alone in the nursery. Does she obey orders, or does she intervene?

The Whole Town's Talking: A Novel

Elmwood Springs, Missouri, is a small town like any other, but something strange is happening out at the cemetery. Still Meadows, as it's called, is anything but still. Funny and profound, this novel in the tradition of Flagg's Can't Wait to Get to Heaven and Thornton Wilder's Our Town deals with universal themes of heaven and earth and everything in between, as Flagg tells a surprising story of life, afterlife, and the mysterious goings-on of ordinary people.

Flight Patterns

Georgia Chambers has spent her life sifting through other people's pasts while trying to forget her own. But then her work as an expert on fine china - especially Limoges - requires her to return to the one place she swore she'd never revisit. It's been 13 years since Georgia left her family home on the coast of Florida, and nothing much has changed except that there are fewer oysters and more tourists.

Publisher's Summary

Maeve Binchy is back with a tale of joy, heartbreak and hope, about a motherless girl collectively raised by a close-knit Dublin community.

When Noel learns that his terminally ill former flame is pregnant with his child, he agrees to take guardianship of the baby girl once she's born. But as a single father battling demons of his own, Noel can't do it alone.

Fortunately, he has a competent, caring network of friends, family and neighbors: Lisa, his unlucky-in-love classmate, who moves in with him to help him care for little Frankie around the clock; his American cousin, Emily, always there with a pep talk; the newly retired Dr. Hat, with more time on his hands than he knows what to do with; Dr. Declan and Fiona and their baby son, Frankie's first friend; and many eager babysitters, including old friends Signora and Aidan and Frankie's doting grandparents, Josie and Charles.

But not everyone is pleased with the unconventional arrangement, especially a nosy social worker, Moira, who is convinced that Frankie would be better off in a foster home. Now it's up to Noel to persuade her that everyone in town has something special to offer when it comes to minding Frankie.

What the Critics Say

“Binchy is a national treasure in her homeland of Ireland, and her latest novel is a perfect illustration of why.…Your heart will have no trouble recognizing the landscape [of this] touching saga.” (Publishers Weekly)

“Reading a Maeve Binchy novel is like settling in for a cozy visit with an old friend. In vintage Binchy style, a cast of colorfully eccentric characters living in a snug Dublin neighborhood seamlessly weave in and out of each other’s lives, united by family, faith, friendship and community....Readers will need a box of tissues handy as the good-hearted residents of St. Jarlath’s Crescent prove that it does indeed take a ‘village to raise a child.’” (Margaret Flanagan, Booklist)

If you are a fan, this is yet another fine example of her craft. At all times Maeve is optimistic. I listen because I know there will be the best ending there can be. She does not shrink from the hard fact of modern life but if there is a positive spin, it will be there. Thank you Maeve for continuing the stories of an Ireland we wish we could visit and people we would love to meet.

At the beginning I was restless, waiting for the author to get to the meat of the story. She goes to great lengths to describe the backgrounds of each character. But then I decided to relax and let the book unfold as it was written...then, I began to love it. When I wasn't listening, I would feel like I was missing something like my keys, glasses, something important...but no, I was missing my friends from Chestnut Court and Dublin, Ireland. This to me is the sign of a great book. It had pulled me so far into the lives of these characters, I did not see myself as separate from them.

The narrator is excellent. The Irish accent makes things that much better.
If you love stories about tragedies bringing people together, mixed with humor and small town charm, where everyone seems to know eachother....this book is for you!

Maeve Binchy writes books that speak about family and relationships, dont expect exciting storylines. Her books show us that no matter where we live and what languages we speak, we share the same hopes,fears and dreams. This book is all about how it "takes a village" to raise a child. So true!

I love the story. It is typical Maeve Binchy which is always wonderful! The characters are well developed and I love that they interlace with other books, so as you read one after the other, you learn more and more about the other people in other favorite books.

Would you be willing to try another one of Sile Bermingham’s performances?

Absolutely not!

Any additional comments?

I loved this story - but it iwas with gritted teeth that I made it through the performance. When staying with the Scottish accent the narrator was fine - but when moving to the other accents it ranged from annoying (American accent) to completely awful (Aussie accent) While I will snatch up every one of Maeve Binchy's books that I have the chance - I will forego the audible version if narrated by Ms. Bermingham.

As usual, Binchy delivers a novel that wraps you up in its arms for a warm, full hug. Creating characters that leap right off the page, Binchy reminds us again that people really aren't all good or all bad. Every one of us is our own unique a blend of both. The piece is performed brilliantly, & I'm sure I'll listen again one of these days when I feel the need to come back home to the sweet embrace of Binchy's quirky, thoughtful, darling Ireland.